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Hacks Allowing Disabled Gamers To Play Guitar Hero

Posted by Soulskill on Fri Nov 21, 2008 04:01 AM
from the getting-out-of-hand dept.
Hardware Hacking Entertainment Games
angrymilkman writes "Here are two interesting new approaches where researchers modified the popular Guitar Hero game so it can be played by gamers with disabilities. Air Guitar Hero modifies the Guitar Hero controller so someone without limbs can play it by using electrodes attached to the user's residual arm. Blind Hero is a mod for Frets on Fire that uses a haptic glove that can turn visual feedback into haptic feedback, allowing blind gamers to play Guitar Hero songs." There have been a variety of Guitar Hero hacks in the past, including a custom drum pad for playing the guitar part, using the plastic guitar as a real instrument, and rocking out with your bike, but it's nice to see some more serious modifications showing up.
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[+] Guitar Hero Hacks 42 comments
Edge Online has a short blurb mentioning a project at the University of California turning the Guitar Hero guitar into a real instrument. From the article: "For the final project of their Computer Audio course, University of California students Travis Chen and Sunny Chan have created Guitar Hero Hack, a plugin for sequencing software Max/MSP that lets players assign switchable banks of samples to each of the controller's buttons, utilizes its tilt switch as a way to clear current audio on any given track, and, the two hope, might be on its way to a fully functioning live instrument." His incredibly impressive demo video is well worth watching.
Submission: Hacks allowing disabled gamers to play Guitar Hero by angrymilkman (957626)
[+] AbleGamers Reviews Games From a Disability Standpoint 124 comments
eldavojohn writes "Early last month a visually impaired gamer sued Sony under the Americans with Disabilities Act (and if you think that people with disabilities don't play games, think again). The AbleGamers Foundation has decided to step forward and provide a rating system for games that blends together a number of factors to determine a score with regard to accessibility. Visual, hearing, motion, closed captioning, speed settings, difficulty settings and even colorblindness options are all taken into account when compiling these scores and reviewing these games."
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  • Brainless (Score:5, Funny)

    by isBandGeek() (1369017) on Friday November 21 2008, @04:10AM (#25843077)
    What about people like me, with no brains, you insensitive clod!

    • Re:Brainless (Score:5, Insightful)

      by dontmakemethink (1186169) on Friday November 21 2008, @05:38AM (#25843459)
      What about people like me, that can actually play guitar!! Do you realize how hard it is to ignore the music I know how to play and instead play Simon Says?

      • Re:Brainless (Score:5, Informative)

        by travbrad (622986) on Friday November 21 2008, @05:53AM (#25843527)

        +1

        I tried guitar hero and there were notes to play that weren't even in the song, and notes in the song that you weren't required to play. That's was very strange for someone who actually plays guitar. I even chose the 2 songs I knew how to play on a guitar, and failed miserably on both of them in guitar hero.

        Oh, and that new Best Buy commercial I saw tonight was pretty funny too. The chick says something about "I've always wanted to be a musician". I was thinking, "well gee maybe you should ya know..learn to play an instrument, instead of playing videogames".

        • Video games can provide the illusion of guitar proficiency much more quickly and easily than learning to play properly.

          I'd love to play an instrument well but I have all the innate musical talent of a tom cat undergoing castration. I'd spend hours working and at the end of it might just about be able to pluck out "twinkle twinkle little star".

          • Re:Brainless (Score:4, Insightful)

            by MistrBlank (1183469) on Friday November 21 2008, @08:59AM (#25844729)

            That's the point. Many people don't want to learn and/or are self conscious while trying to learn. A video game or simulation that makes it feel easy, while still emulating the motions and producing more pleasing results.

            Guitar Hero really is the next step in air guitaring... with a score.

        • While it seems difficult in reverse, it still might help someone before they are learning a true instrument. I'm sure that Guitar Hero & Rock Band do teach good finger coordination and decent timing skills and music can be simplified to a combo of good rhythm and a melody which usually requires decent finger coordination. Of course good music comes from the soul etc. but it does seem to teach basic techniques in a fun way. I would encourage those interested in playing an instrument to practise with it,

          • While it seems difficult in reverse, it still might help someone before they are learning a true instrument. I'm sure that Guitar Hero & Rock Band do teach good finger coordination and decent timing skills and music can be simplified to a combo of good rhythm and a melody which usually requires decent finger coordination.

            I know a person who was learning to play an electric guitar (he was a restaurant owner, so I'd come in and hear him practics as I ordered my food). One day, I came in with GH2 and he as

        • Having played both, Rock Band is a lot closer to the real notes and feels a lot more natural than GH.

          That said, it ain't perfect. Most noticeably different is In Bloom.

      • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

        by PhattyMatty (916963)
        http://www.guitarrising.com/index.html [guitarrising.com] Here's a version that lets you use a real guitar.

      • >What about people like me, that can actually play guitar!!

        I just accept that I'm much better at guitar than at Guitar Hero, and let it go.

        On the other hand, I'm better at guitar than at air guitar, and that really bothers me.

    • Guitar Hero is already designed with brainless people in mind.

      • Guitar Hero is already designed with brainless people in mind.

        Ummm ... Harmonix was a spinoff from the MIT Media Lab.

        Meaning, a bunch of very smart people got together and came up with some notions for "different" kinds of musical instruments and how to simplify it. I seem to recall lots of stuff they were doing whereby they could have a bunch of school kids play with a symphony with very little training.

        It's a simplified interface, it's not brainless.

        Me, I think making the musicality of it so easy and acc

  • Check the EULA for Guitar Hero 3 (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 21 2008, @04:46AM (#25843255)

    Last time I checked, the EULA on the loading screen explicitly states that you are only licensed to use the software with an official Guitar Hero controller.

    I really like cool hacks like this, but I wonder how long it will be before someone starts to enforce it..?

    • Re:Check the EULA for Guitar Hero 3 (Score:4, Interesting)

      by joemod (1068624) on Friday November 21 2008, @06:22AM (#25843629)
      Maybe the EULA explicitly states that because Activision wants to stop 3rd companies from creating controllers for the game without getting a licence. 3rd companies can create unlicensed controllers but if users are not allowed to use them they are not going to buy them (at least that's the legal way). Anyway Activision may license controllers which are designed for impaired players free of charge or for very low fee.
    • Last time I checked, the EULA on the loading screen explicitly states that you are only licensed to use the software with an official Guitar Hero controller.

      Good luck to them enforcing that. The right that the publisher has that I do not is 'copyright' - the right to copy, plus associated rights regarding public performance and so forth. The idea behind an EULA is that in installing THE SOFTWARE You are creating a copy, and to do that You need a licence from Us. But here, when I use THE SOFTWARE I don't c

      • Last time I checked, the EULA on the loading screen explicitly states that you are only licensed to use the software with an official Guitar Hero controller.

        Good luck to them enforcing that. The right that the publisher has that I do not is 'copyright' - the right to copy, plus associated rights regarding public performance and so forth. The idea behind an EULA is that in installing THE SOFTWARE You are creating a copy, and to do that You need a licence from Us. But here, when I use THE SOFTWARE I don't create a copy at all, I run direct from the disc (YMMV, dependent on your system).

        So I don't need a licence, because I'm doing nothing that would otherwise infringe the copyright holder's rights. I can do as I please with THE SOFTWARE as long as that's true: I can shove it up my arse if I like and they can't stop me. I only need a licence if my use of THE SOFTWARE would otherwise be a breach of copyright.

        You have a rather odd view of copyright and license agreements. The EULA is a contract between you and the software vendor; separate from copyright. While the enforceability of EULA terms is open to debate, vendors can define conditions on the use of their software; you can agree and buy it or not agree and not buy it.

        Now, if Nintendo tried to enforce the EULA to stop disabled gamers from playing GH3, Nintendo would have a PR nightmare to contend with and is better off either ignoring the mod or working w

        • The EULA is a contract between you and the software vendor; separate from copyright. While the enforceability of EULA terms is open to debate, vendors can define conditions on the use of their software; you can agree and buy it or not agree and not buy it.

          I don't buy the game from Activision. I buy it from HMV. I hand over some cash and they hand me a disc in a box. Contract for sale of goods fulfilled to the satisfaction of both parties. Nobody at HMV ever mentioned anything about separate contracts, and

          • I don't see where I have any contract with Activision at all.

            One theory: The contract begins the moment your Wii begins to load and decrypt the disc. Discs for modern game consoles are encrypted, and decryption of a work encrypted by the copyright owner is an exclusive right of the copyright owner in the United States (home of Slashdot) since October 1998, when 17 USC 1201 became law as part of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Similar statutes implementing the WIPO Copyright Treaty have gone into effect in numerous other developed countries. As I understand it,

          • The EULA is a contract between you and the software vendor; separate from copyright. While the enforceability of EULA terms is open to debate, vendors can define conditions on the use of their software; you can agree and buy it or not agree and not buy it.

            I don't buy the game from Activision. I buy it from HMV. I hand over some cash and they hand me a disc in a box. Contract for sale of goods fulfilled to the satisfaction of both parties. Nobody at HMV ever mentioned anything about separate contracts, and once they have my money I don't think HMV care whether I play the game with an official controller, an unofficial controller, psychic powers, or indeed whether I play the game at all instead of, say, setting fire to it.

            However, HMV sold you the physical disk; which you own, and a license to the software on it; just as if you bought any other copyrighted material.

            Purchasing a copy does not give you the right to use it in ways not covered by the license agreement, assuming a court finds the license enforceable.

            I don't see where I have any contract with Activision at all. Sure, something comes up on screen saying 'don't use this game with other controllers', but fuck 'em; as I see it, short of copyright violation I can do as I please.

            You have agreed to Activision's license by using the software; and are bound by it as a result.

            I do not like shrink wrap licenses that don't allow you to either read the terms before you buy or return the software if

      • The right that the publisher has that I do not is 'copyright' [...] But here, when I use THE SOFTWARE I don't create a copy at all, I run direct from the disc

        Copyright: You don't run from the disc; you run from RAM. Statute (Title 17, United States Code, section 117, and foreign counterparts) grants you the right to make this copy into RAM, but if you download any DLC, you may waive your rights under this statute (per the bnetd case).

        Patent: Konami, the developer of Beatmania, owns patents on music games where each key is associated to a parallel track for note marks. Konami has recently sued the publishers of Guitar Hero and Rock Band to enforce these patent

    • But if you own the console, the game and the controller, you can do whatever you want with them, don't you?
    • It's scheduled to happen right before the suit brought on over one of the various persons with disabilities laws.

    • I really like cool hacks like this, but I wonder how long it will be before someone starts to enforce it..?

      Um, probably never?

  • Hmm... non-blind might benifit from haptic too (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 21 2008, @04:57AM (#25843315)

    I ponder if the haptic glove would help dyspraxic people like me play Guitar Hero. My hand-eye co-ordination leaves something to be desired; thusly Guitar Hero is impossible for me to play.

    What if there's any other such devices to replace dual-stick console controlers. Things like the 360 or Playstation 2 & 3 controler cause no end of problems to me (movement being one stick, looking being the other, but since they're the same motor action I often mix them up).

    Anyone else out there stuck with the same problems?

      • Nothing with moving left while looking right and vice versa. I haven't yet met anyone that doesn't move both at the same time

        If nobody else knows how to move sideways by tilting the aim stick and move stick in opposite directions, that's your chance to play against them and beat them using your superior tactics. If you prefer co-op, sorry :-(

  • It really seems super-impractical, but I'm sure certain people will enjoy it if that's their only option. Check it out [youtube.com]

  • The one true glove (Score:3, Funny)

    by greg1104 (461138) <gsmith@gregsmith.com> on Friday November 21 2008, @05:37AM (#25843451) Homepage

    I'm still waiting for the Nintendo Power Glove interface to the game

  • ... a video game for blind people?

    Though an audio game might be pretty cool - something like wearing headphones while playing Battlezone with really loud tanks.

    Or maybe an audio only version of Leisure Suit Larry. Giggety.

    • It'd be nice if game makers actually paid attention to realistic sound effects, instead of just using that 800W gaming machine for rendering photorealistic raindrops with accurate physics over a canned loop of rain noises.
      The hardware to do decent 3D sound was there a decade ago, but Creative bought everyone out and left the end user with their shitty reverb effects.

  • "That deaf, dumb and blind kid sure plays a mean guitar..." as Pinball Wizard plays in Guitar Hero.

  • what about pinball? (Score:3, Funny)

    by gEvil (beta) (945888) on Friday November 21 2008, @06:33AM (#25843683)
    Why are these people playing Guitar Hero? I thought they were supposed to be good at pinball.
    • Confirmed fake clip, indeed. Why would a bike not turn left and right when the handlebars are turned, for one? Also, if the guy on the bike is playing a guitar hero mod, then the section where he's turning his head right to look at his own reflection in a storefront is highly suspicious. It just screams of "hey look, I'm really really riding a bike and not just playing make-believe!"

  • So people can now pretend to play a fake guitar?

    I know I should be snarky, but this is strangely appealing to me.

  • I have no problem with this article, really, but I had thought that the military prosthesis tech was trickling down to commercial grade devices. Its a little disappointing to think that even though a prosthetic arm with individual fingers is available and in use, if a civilian loses an arm in an accident, they'll never see it, except if they visit someone in a VA hospital... (The article mentions that the target audience is veterans because commercial devices only open/close the hand).

    I have no problem wi
  • I know this is a lil off topic, but...

    Does anyone have a suggestion for those who have one of the two? I would play one of the Guitar hero games from time to time in the past, but it recently just got too painful to continue playing the game more than a few minutes (read, maybe 3 minutes of playing) in. Fingers would burn, tops of hands would feel tingly and numb, all sorts of interesting stuff. Figured I would ask, couldn't hurt...

    • Does anyone have a suggestion for those who have one of the two?

      No direct personal experience with either, but you might be SOL.

      When I first started playing after 3-4 songs my hand was sore and I needed a break -- over time it became easier. It's hard on the hands for anyone who doesn't have those issues.

      Seems like it would be an action almost guaranteed to exacerbate those conditions.

      Cheers

  • So I can play Dragonforce on Expert. Seriously, do I need to be on meth to play this? Someone link up my brain to the game, please! *grin*
      • yeah, Frets on Fire is free, BUT the vast majority of the songs that people put into it... are pirated... so, it's much like Stepmania, only really useful with pirating.

        • Vast abount of the "pirated songs" are also incredibly half arsed and sound like utter crap.

          I wish that a band in europe or asia would do some cover songs for FoF and make them sound decent and sell the packs. I'd pay $5.00 via paypal to a guy doing "shock the monkey" but with a very thick asian accent.

          Hell I'll pay for a bad garage band version, because most of the illegal FoF songs are incredibly crappy rips.

          • I wish that a band in europe or asia would do some cover songs for FoF and make them sound decent and sell the packs. I'd pay $5.00 via paypal to a guy doing "shock the monkey" but with a very thick asian accent.

            But would you pay someone to do Shock the Monkey and Win $20 [everything2.com]?

    • After they managed the difficult task to allow people without talent to play, the project for people without limbs was just a spin-off...

    • The pool of talentless do-nothing "hehe look at me I can pound on a piece of plastic" dim wits is being expanded. Repeat after me: Guitar Hero is for Morons. You wanna see what Guitar Hero should have been? Check out synthesiagame.com --- a game for real musicians.

      I assume you made the same complaint about Call of Duty 4, and recommended something else as 'a game for real soldiers'?

    • Thanks to the damn preview button what started off as a hateful rant was turned into a constructive comment and posted AC.

      I guess that's what you get.

    • I've always thought that was a bit awkward, like someone saying, "I'm not handicapped, I'm handi-capable!". Do you make this suggestion because you're able-bodied but think it's the preferred term, or because you consider yourself to be "differently abled" and want others to use that term? This isn't a troll, I'm actually curious.
    • The terminology REALLY depends on who you're talking to. The one that I have recently come to find that many preferred is "person with a disability," which allows someone to not define themselves by their disability and uses it as a descriptor instead. (Props to Joni Erickson Tada and her Joni and Friends organization for the experiences and education.)

      And then you run across the blind population, many of which I've found completely embrace the term "blind" for ANY level of legal blindness and hate any o

    • Sure, GH isnt playing music; but its interacting with it and i can tell that having progressed to expert, hand-hand and hand-eye coordination does improve, even for a past-30-year-old, like myself. Ive also found that ones ear gets more tuned to aspects of songs now, that you've focused on certain instruments.

      I have to agree with you on this one.

      One of the reasons I think that GH-style games are so popular is that you do get to interact with the music. It's fun, but, it also lets you learn a little more ab

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